By Chung Ah-young
Staff Reporter
Many an ambitious amateur musician dreams about making it big, breaking into the mainstream charts _ mostly on television networks _ to win a wide fan base.
But not all would-be stars take that route. There are those who first earn the support of a small crowd and then reach the wider fields later.
Oh! Brothers, a Korean rock'n' roll band, first started out busking.
The five-member group, founded in 1998, went anywhere there were people ready to jam together. From subway stations to university festivals or the streets, you name it, the group went.
But it was on the subways and streets that the band became famous for its performances in the late 1990s. Currently, the band consists of Choi Sung-soo, on vocals, Lee Sung-bae, on saxophone, Lee Sung-moon, bass, Ahn Tae-joon, drums, and Kim Jeoung-woong on guitar, who has newly joined the band for its fourth album.
``We first began performing on the streets because the streets were too dull and vapid. So we wanted to cheer people up on the street,'' Lee Sung-moon, the bassist, said in an interview with The Korea Times.
Lee said the band's brand of rock'n' roll, lends itself to performances on the street because of its cheerful and easy-to-listen-to rhythms and lyrics.
``People throughout the world are very familiar with rock 'n' roll. But unfortunately, the music has not been that popular in Korea until now,'' he said.
Better known as ``street band,'' the group is known as a band reproducing the kind of rock 'n' roll that dominated the United States in 1950s.
Rock 'n' roll is a genre of music that evolved in the U.S. in the late 1940s and became popular in the early 1950s, quickly spreading to the rest of the world.
It later spawned the various sub-genres of what is now referred to simply as rock.
``Rock 'n' roll is like a `lost music genre' in Korean music history because when the music was explosively popular worldwide, Korea was at war. So Korea in a sense missed the timing for rock to come in,'' he explained.
``Our band aims at reviving an earlier style of rock'n roll, which has not been tried before,'' he said.
``Rock 'n' roll is at the root of all kinds of modern pop music. Musicians grow in a rich soil of rock 'n' roll,'' said Ahn Tae-joon, drummer of the band.
There are many rock musicians in Korea, whose music have evolved from rock 'n' roll, Ahn said. ``They are all rock musicians doing different types of rock 'n' roll, which varies in accordance with the period,'' he said.
After gaining a solid base of fervent supporters who followed them wherever they played, the band was even cast in ``Waikiki Brothers'' (2001) and ``Oollala Sisters'' (2002) and ``Surpirse'' (2002) and other major TV dramas.
The band attended the Fuji Rock Festival in Japan in 2005 and the Mosaic Music Festival in Singapore last year.
It has released its fourth official album, ``How Much Getting' Very Hot.''
The album presents light-hearted and cheerful melodies and rhythms about a funny and common love story.
``Our fourth album is not different from our first one. We're pursuing the same music style, just rock 'n' roll from the 1950s, which shook in the U.S.,'' Lee Sung-bae, saxophonist, said.
Sung-bae, a younger brother of Sung-moon, said that the band is also seeking retro fashion codes that were popular in the1950s.
The five usually perform sporting weird hairstyles and funny suits, which resemble the appearance of British pop icons The Beatles and American retro styles in culture at that time.
``Rock 'n' roll was a sort of dance music that made listeners dance at that time. So we love rock 'n' roll very much because it is easy to enjoy,'' Sung-bae said.
Sung-bae said that with the development of the Internet in Korea people's cultural standards have gone up. ``Listeners are always a step ahead of musicians. Musicians should try to keep abreast of their fans' pace for catching up with good music,'' he said.
But the band said that it always will be loyal to its original music style.
``We will never lose our first intention to start the original rock 'n' roll music whenever we face harsher times in our music career,'' the band members said.
The band will perform a showcase for its fourth album at Rolling Hall near Hongik University Aug. 20. Crying Nut, another local punk rock band, will be the special guests.